My first experience of 100mph motoring was aged six, in a Mini Cooper owned by a girlfriend of my mum, on a stretch of the A1 outside Stamford [ironically, very close to CAR’s current HQ – Ed].
It took an achingly long run-up to achieve an indicated tonne on that wok-sized speedo… Though the racket was mighty, I suspect the actual speed was a tad less impressive.
My only other Mini encounter, as an architectural student in Kingston, was a little less wholesome.
I was a passenger in a friend’s Mini when she was T-boned by a Routemaster bus in the one-way system.
The bus neatly removed absolutely everything forward of the A-pillars, leaving us sitting in situ, unscathed, with our feet on the road. That’s the day I took up smoking.